hey guys I'm Jodi Taylor a university program specialist here at Google and
today I'm going to be walking you through a little bit about our interview
process first we'll be going over an overview of the interview process and
what you can expect when you're going through our interview secondly I'll be
going over how to build a strong response what is the framework you
should utilize third we'll actually have an opportunity to practice a leaked
Google interview question together and lastly we'll go over some interview
basics so Google is made up of incredible people and there are some
core central tenets we're looking for as we're hiring folks one is how a
candidate thinks how does the candidate use data logic and reasoning as they're
responding to a question two is their leadership skills that doesn't
necessarily come in the form of a title what leadership means is emergent
leadership how are you proactive how are you taking
leadership initiatives on campus or in your job 3 is role related knowledge
that doesn't necessarily come in the form of an fancy internship what that
means is transferable skills do you have the basic skill set to transfer into the
role that you're looking for at Google and lastly is googliness googliness is
this really nebulous word that we kind of made up and essentially means
intellectual curiosity it means are you willing to collaborate work with other
people and think 10x or at scale but today in this presentation we're going
to be focusing on that first tenant I mentioned which is how a candidate
thinks so after your resume screen oftentimes we'll be invited to a
interview at Google or on the phone and you'll be invited to a GCA interview GCA
stands for general cognitive ability and that sounds like a fancy word are really
scary phrase but in reality it's just how do you break down complex problems
and come up with really thoughtful solutions the GCA interview is broken up
into two parts the first part is a behavioral part of the interview those
are past behaviors and assessing those past behaviors so a sample behavioral
interview question could look like tell me about a time when you let a team tell
me about a time when you communicate it effectively tell me about a time when
you failed the second part of a GCA interview is the hypothetical or
situational part of the interview and those are questions that are assessing
real-life Google situations that you may actually face we'll walk through that in
a second we ask these questions for really specific reasons one it's an
evaluation of your problem-solving skills how are using reasoning and
rationale and data to solve complex issues secondly it's an insight into
your working style and lastly it's an opportunity to talk through problems
that you actually may face at Google or other Googlers have faced in the past
you may have heard that we ask really complex questions like how many golf
balls can fit inside a 747 jet we actually no longer ask those questions
and instead have moved towards those hypothetical or situational questions so
what is Google assessing when we ask these sorts of hypothetical or
situational questions one it's your understanding of the question so
oftentimes your interviewer will give you too much or too little information
we want to make sure that you're understanding the core and central issue
so making sure that you're distilling through all of the excess noise and
excess words and making sure that you're really getting to the core issue at hand
second is your preparation strategy we don't mean how much you study the night
before about Google what we mean is how much information that's been given to
you are you able to actually thoughtfully parse through that
information and formulate a coherent and dynamic response third is your ability
to identify solutions so these responses are often open-ended there is no right
or wrong way to answer these GCA questions more importantly how are you
able to identify a solution justify that solution and communicate that solution
to your interviewer so now we're going to walk through a framework of how to
build a really strong response please keep in mind that this framework is not
prescriptive there may be some questions that require all of these elements of
the framework some questions that only require a couple we just want you to
keep this in mind as you're going through the interview process the first
part always take a moment before responding these questions are often
complex or have a few layers please make sure that you're taking a moment to
respond even feel free to ask the interviewer to repeat the question or
say can I have a moment before responding also feel free to bring pen
and paper and write down the question as the interviewer is asking it secondly
ask clarifying questions like I said earlier oftentimes who get too little or
too much information and you want to make sure you're extracting out all the
information from the interviewer so that you can appropriately and effectively
answer that question third share logical assumptions
once again you're not going to have all the information that you need to answer
this question so you're going to make some logical leaps in order to formulate
an appropriate response don't worry we'll go through what this looks like in
a second for is show your work so that doesn't necessarily mean showing your
interview your pen and paper with all your notes what that means is
communicating to your interviewer your thought process communication is
incredibly critical during this time as you're thinking and as you're iterating
through your solution make sure that of course you're writing it down but also
communicating it in a succinct and coherent manner to the interviewer so
let's say you come up with an incredible solution and you communicate this to
your interviewer don't just leave it there make sure that you consider pros
and cons or you think about how you would measure success and lastly tie it
back to the role if you can oftentimes these questions are role related meaning
that the question that you'll get will be really specific to the role that
you're applying for and so if you can tie back your answer really nicely to
the role that you're applying for now I'll invite my colleague Kelsey up
and we're going to work through a leaked Google interview question together now
I'm here with my coworker Kelsey and we are going to go through a leaked
interview question together hey Kelsey hey hi everyone the first question is
imagine you are in charge of organizing the grand opening event of a new Google
office how would you plan this event awesome so please remember the steps in
building a really strong response so first always take a moment before
responding and secondly remember to ask clarifying questions here are some
clarifying questions and I would ask where is the new Google Office Cambridge
Massachusetts is there a budget you can decide the budget there was a similar
event in the New York City office last year and their budget was $50,000
wonderful and how many people are attending one hundred people so Kelsey
took a moment were responding to the question she also
asked him really thoughtful clarifying questions and now she's going to share
some logical assumptions here are some of the assumptions that I would make
assumption number one I will assume that there is a facilities team on site to
help me organize this event assumption number two I'll also assume that the
objective of this event is to welcome new Googlers to the Cambridge office
assumption number three since New York City is a larger City than Cambridge
I'll assume this grand opening will be smaller
I'll also assume we have a ten thousand dollar budget across 100 people remember
the framework first Kelty took a moment before responding secondly she asked
those really thoughtful clarifying questions third she shared out her
logical assumptions and now she's going to show her work which means actually
sharing out her thought process so far I'm assuming we have a budget of $100
per person I'm also assuming I will have the capacity to coordinate with someone
in the Cambridge office lastly I will also assume a logistical needs can be
solved by local vendors here is an example of an ideal Google solution
first I'm assuming there is a facilities team on site to assist with this project
and all logistical efforts can be supported internally I would reach out
to that team to begin planning and to assess if I will have to use outside
vendors second I'll assume we'll have a budget of $100 per person therefore I
know I'll have ample budget for food drinks and decor third because the
objective of the event is to welcome new Googlers to the office I would ensure
that I am inclusive of all Googlers in my planning and finally I would collect
an experienced feedback survey from the New York City event and incorporate it
into my planning so once again Kelsey took a moment before responding
she asked those clarifying questions she shared out her logical assumptions she
showed her work but remember don't just leave it at the exemplar answer take it
to that next step and either consider pros and cons or think about how you'd
measure success here is how I would measure my success
for my solution sending out a post-event survey to the attendees to measure
impact against the intended objective capacity to stay within budget number of
attendees and will my project plan be used to plan future grand openings so we
just walk through a leaked Google interview question together not so bad
right now you'll have the capacity to actually practice at home we'll share
another leak to Google interview question with you and feel free to take
some time to practice at home as well so here is another linked Google interview
question that you can practice at home imagine you're working on an email
product and a competitor starts charging a $5 monthly fee for their product how
would you assess the situation and what recommendation would you make to your
team so here's what interviewers are thinking as you're answering these
questions one - the candidate understand the
question and including the basic problem - did they ask clarifying questions
remember clarifying questions are incredibly important to get to that
right answer 3 what relevant information stakeholders and variables were
considered please keep in mind that the interviewer may say things as you're
asking those clarifying questions such as you decide or you pick or you choose
feel comfortable in that ambiguity and continue to work through using your best
assumptions - the candidate identify multiple solution options remember there
is no prescriptive way to answer these questions there are multiple right
answers just choose the best one that you can justify were they able to
reasonably justify why their solution was the best option communication is
incredibly important during this process so making sure you're communicating why
you're justifying this particular solution and lastly did the candidate
incorporate any feedback hints from probing questions the interviewer is
there to support you and to help you through your journey as you're answering
this question so if they're giving you feedback make sure to incorporate that
feedback and pivot as necessary thank you so much for tuning into our
interview prep guide we hope you found it helpful we hope to see that Google
one day Bye